


Only a Matter of Mime

by karalovesallthegirls



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F, Sexual Content, mime shenanigans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-04
Updated: 2018-08-17
Packaged: 2019-05-02 00:33:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 13,390
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14532798
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/karalovesallthegirls/pseuds/karalovesallthegirls
Summary: Kara's a mime. Lena learns to deal with that.





	1. don't waste my mime

**Author's Note:**

  * For [salsayourface](https://archiveofourown.org/users/salsayourface/gifts).



> The first 1.3k is an edited version of what I posted originally on tumblr, the rest is a birthday gift for my girlfriend because that's the kind of relationship we have. There's a second part but there was no way I was going to finish it before the deadline, so that'll come up probably by next Friday. After that is SBKAU, promise!

Despite the various rumors fluttering around the office, Lena is not a robot.

She just has a particular way of doing things and wanting things done. She isn’t heartless, nor is she purposely malicious. She just expects the same level of excellence from others as she expects from herself. Naturally, this hasn’t won her many friends.

According to the rumors Lena has no sense of joy or pleasure, but the truth is her happiness comes from solitude. Her greatest pleasure in fact is the forty five minute block she gets every single day for lunch, and like clockwork she finds herself on her favorite bench in her favorite part of the park, eating her favorite lunch (a tomato sandwich - no crust - a small salad, and a bag of grapes). This is her one time each day to spend in silence and solitude away from the annoyed whispers and glares, and Lena treasures this space.

This makes the day the mime appeared especially heinous.  
  
All at once her quiet patch of park is filled with excited crowds of tourists all gawking at some face painted buffoon battling invisible enemies. Like clockwork she is there, this stupid fool, building invisible walls and walking against powerful gusts of wind, boxing in delighted children and adults alike. And while that in itself is insufferable enough, for whatever reason the mime always tries to (quite literally) lasso Lena into her acts. There have been at least a dozen invisible lassos, fishing lines, and even baseballs thrown Lena’s way in bids for her attention, but all are steadfastly ignored and rejected. Fools will not be humored. Still, the mime persists.

Today though will perhaps will be a day of peace, as storm clouds have threatened since early morning and all around the air is filled with a sense of gloom. Surely the fool will opt to stay in her little mime home rather than venture out. Lunch bag in hand and a smile on her face, Lena nearly skips her way into the mostly empty park back towards her beloved corner.  
  
But of course, life never does go in her favor. She stops short when she sees the fool there alone, miming out scenes all by herself. Truly Lena’s life will never know peace, and all the resentment that has been building over the weeks of this torture come bubbling out as she snaps,

“You look like an idiot.”  
  
The mime jumps back in exaggerated surprise, painted on eyebrows high and expressive. Lena feels her eye twitch at the sight. She truly hates this clown.

“Every day you’re here, and it’s stupid. You’re stupid. And ridiculous. Also, I hope you know no one likes you.”

The fool clutches tightly at her chest as if Lena’s words are daggers burying deep in her heart. She staggers, clutching at the invisible handle of Lena’s knife, nearly stumbling to her knees. It only makes Lena angrier, and she moves to storm past only for the fool to grab her arm, touching her for the first time. The mime waves her hand in a negative manner, trying to pull Lena away from her bench. Lena rips her hand free.  
  
“Don’t you dare touch me,” she snaps again, and tries to step around only for the fool again to step in her way. She’s pulled her hands together now in a submissive plea, her eyes begging Lena to stop, but with a huff Lena blows past her and sits down with an angry thump.  
  
Lena knows her mistake almost immediately, the damp cold sinking through her clothes before she even notices the WET PAINT sign. Without thinking Lena jumps up with angry cry, her back now striped with lines of brown and her lunch bag tumbled to the ground. The mime cringes, her body made small as she gestures down, and Lena realizes that the fool is pointing towards the rather muddy puddle her lunch has fallen into. Lena presses her hands over her face then, lets out a long angry huff of air as she feels her will to live slither out of her down to the mud below, and after a moment she looks up to see the mime shuffling awkwardly back and forth with a worried look in her eyes. Like everything the fool does, it’s infuriating.

“Really?” Lena drawls, “You couldn’t just say ‘hey, the paint is wet.’ You had to try and mime it to me?”

The fool shrugs haplessly, gives her a surprisingly pretty smile for someone whose face is covered in white and black makeup, then holds up her finger as if to say wait a moment. Lena considers just going home and never returning to this job as the mime goes and fumbles through the backpack she always leaves resting against the nearby oak tree. After a moment she returns with a pack of wet wipes and what looks to be a sandwich wrapped in tin foil.  
  
She holds them out as an offering to Lena with a bright, goofy smile. Hesitantly, Lena accepts the wet wipes but eyes the sandwich wearily. The mime seems confused at this, but then lights up as if realizing something great and once again fumbles around her backpack before pulling out a knife. Lena watches as the fool sits cross-legged on the floor with the sandwich balanced on her lap and carefully unwraps the foil to reveal what looks to be a tomato sandwich.

Slowly, the fool cuts the crust away.  
  
She dusts her hands dramatically and carefully gathers the crust to discard, then offers the sandwich again. She seems so earnest in this moment that before Lena’s brain can catch up her hands are already reaching out to accept the offering. The mime gives her a smile of pure joy at that, and Lena is pleasantly surprised to peek in and see it is in fact a tomato sandwich prepared just the way she likes it. She’s not sure if she should feel flattered or terrified.

Suddenly a techno beat chirps from the mime’s back pocket, and she watches as she pulls the phone out and answers a call. Lena is prepared to fight her right then but, surprisingly, the mime doesn’t say a word. She just listens and hums occasionally before hanging up. She gestures towards herself, then points away. Lena nods. She pulls a few wet wipes out and tries to hand the pack back, but the fool dramatically gestures for her to keep it. With a flourish she slings her backpack over her shoulder and takes a bow, then much to Lena’s irritation presses a kiss to her own palm, clenches her fist as if she held it there, then with a big wind up throws it at Lena.  
  
Lena just glares at her, mentally picturing the kiss bouncing off her and landing in the grass. The fool mimes a deep belly laugh and shoots her a wink before skipping away.  
  
Lena ends up settled in the grass with her suit jacket laid before her, scrubbing at it with wipes while munching on the sandwich. Her eyes keep flitting to the spot where she’d pictured the kiss rebounding, and it’s so stupid of her to even think about it but it continues to pull her. Her phone alarm beeps her five minute warning, and she pulls her still faintly painted jacket back on her shoulders. As she begins to push herself up, she pauses again over the spot in the grass.  
  
With a quick glance around, she reaches hesitantly out and grabs at the air over the spot, holds her hand in a fist as if something secret were hidden within her grip. Hesitantly, she slides her hand into her pocket, opens it as if to let go. As if she is saving the kiss for later.

She can feel her face go red at her foolishness and she jumps up with a huff, all but sprinting her way back to work.

Such a fool.

* * *

  
It’s a week before she sees the idiot again, though if she had her way it would be a lifetime. Her mother has decided to focus her attention on their division, which is code for ‘make sure Lena isn’t fucking it up’. Ever since she took over here she has made no “right” choices. 

Their production is too low, her management style too lenient. They should have invested here instead of there - how could she mess that up? Lex would never have messed that up.  
  
She can feel herself collapsing inward, compressing from all sides. It feels as if her body hopes to shrink and shrink until it disappears from view. At least that would be a good choice by her mother’s standards.

Even worse, every call she ignores results in a call to an underling, who panics at the anger of their CEO. _Please answer the phone_ , they ask Lena, _she says she’ll fire the whole division if you don’t._ Lena sighs; her mother always was so good at emotional blackmail. She usually takes the call.

But it’s already two at this point and she’s spoken to her mother eleven times and she swears if she has to hear Lillian’s voice one more time she’ll lose it. So she grabs her bagged lunch and marches to the park before another call can rope her in, and of course the fool is there again. 

The fool is there, at her spot in her park, and Lena’s phone is ringing and ringing and even here she can’t find peace. She tosses it on the bench with more force than necessary and refuses to acknowledge the concern in the fool’s eyes.

“I’m not answering it,” she says decisively, as if the mime needed to know. “I’m not in the mood to get yelled at.”  
  
The idiot’s brow creases at that, it’s concern emphasized by the depth of her stupid paint, but the look seems to flash for only a moment across her otherwise paint-hidden face before the mime jumps into her next routine: she mimes answering a flip phone, pressing it to her ear. All at once it’s like she’s somehow blasted backwards by it, arm fully extended holding it away from herself and head lulling back as if battling supersonic wind. She struggles against the invisible force, trying with her free wavering hand to reach towards the invisible phone before finally, finally reaching it and slamming it shut so dramatically Lena almost hears the clasp of plastic. The mime tosses the phone over her shoulder and wipes at her brow with a flourish. It’s so ridiculous, so physically exaggerated, that it takes a minute for Lena to realize she’s laughing. Genuinely, unintentionally laughing, and more annoyingly the mime has realized as well. More effort than she cares to admit is needed for her to clamp down on that bubbling laugh. She hates the self-satisfied smirk the fool is giving her.

“You’re not funny,” Lena says with a confidence she doesn’t feel. The mime just winks at her.  
  
Idiot.

* * *

  
It’s not a ritual - because Lena would never build any part of her life around a stupid park clown - but it does begin happening on a daily basis. 

She walks to the park, she eats her lunch, she argues with the mime despite being the only one speaking every time. She wins most of the fights, maybe, although the fool does seem a little too confident by the end of her break every day. Either way, it becomes painfully apparent that the mime is becoming a regular figure in her life and as pathetic as that makes her feel there is also a comfort to it. Lena likes consistency, even when it’s her obnoxious park enemy. If she were to consider it more deeply, she might even say having someone to speak to regularly about herself is therapeutic. She refuses to consider it more deeply.

A pattern has certainly emerged, though: the mime is there every weekday for at least Lena’s lunch hour, who knows if longer. She always attracts some degree of a crowd, although Lena notes the majority are tourists. She might be the idiot’s only consistent audience. How embarrassing.

Regardless, there is a level of comfort in routine, and Lena finds herself growing used to the clown’s presence. As sad as it may be, the mime is always happy to see her. That alone is a comfort.

Which is why Lena can’t stop the words from escaping when the mime plops down beside her: “Today’s my birthday, you know.”  
  
The mime’s entire face lights up as she flings her arms in the air, spirit fingers flying in joy. Lena smiles as well; it’s been years since someone reacted with that much joy to her. The fool holds up a finger telling her to wait, then riffles through her bag for an obnoxious amount of time before pulling out a handful of crumbled papers. She looks down at them with disappointment before straightening them out and offering them to Lena.  
  
They’re two coupons for free cookies at the local bakery and a five dollar bill.  
  
Lena can’t help but laugh, shaking her head.  
  
“No, keep that! You’ll like cookies more than I will. Thank you but I’m quite alright.”  
  
The mime frowns deeply at that but retracts her offering. After a moment she opts for a different approach: she jumps up and begins to mime what Lena can only assume is her riding either a giraffe or some sort of dinosaur.  
  
Either way, it’s the best birthday lunch Lena’s had in years.

* * *

  
The Monday after she comes to the park to find a wrapped present on her bench. 

“What is this supposed to be?” she asks, incredulous. The mime just shrugs, an innocent pout painted on her lips. She gestures for Lena to open it to find out.  
  
Terrified and hesitant, Lena unwraps it to find a book.  
  
Specifically, it’s the next book in the series she has been reading this past month in the park. It had only just come out and Lena hadn’t had the chance to buy it yet.

Without meaning to she holds it close to her, jaw clenched.  
  
“Thank you,” she says softly, and the mime just winks at her.

Such a fool.

* * *

  
Another invader arrives, one even worse than her idiot fool.

Some sort of street dancer shows up during their lunch one day and now Lena is stuck watching some man bop and weave and noodle his way across her sidewalk, his boombox’s bass nearly shaking her book in her hand.

This is an invasion of the highest offense (at least the stupid idiot mime is _quiet)_ and Lena looks to the mime for a shared sense of disdain, but of course she overestimated the fool’s competence. Not only is the mime not equally annoyed by the dancer’s presence, she’s even begun to bob along to the head splitting beat. Seemingly unaffected by Lena’s look of betrayal, the idiot pulses her way over to the dancer who has now taken notice of the striped Judas.  
  
With a laugh he begins to dance at and around her, challenging and enticing all in one. Much to Lena’s absolute horror, the idiot meets the challenge.  
  
And she’s really, really good at it.  
  
_Fuck._

It makes sense if you put some thought into it (which Lena has not, obviously, put any thought into her park buffoon) - _of course_ someone who expresses themselves entirely through movement would be a decent dancer. Lena ignores the fact that decent is a dramatic undersell, that the mime’s body rolls and pulsates with a level of precision Lena could never achieve.

The street dancer does a series of intricate moves and the mime matches them, he does a body roll and she follows suit. Lena shifts uncomfortably. A crowd has formed to watch the strangest dance battle in history go down and Lena has to elbow her way to the front just to keep her idiot in view.

The dancer twists his hips to the beat with a grin, lets his hand trail up his side and pull his shirt up enough to show his abs. The mime laughs - out loud! - and goes into a spin, then follows his movements. Slowly, almost seductively she lets her hands trail her body as well, pulls her stupid striped shirt up to show defined abs that rival her opponent. Everyone in the crowd is going wild, hooping and hollering, but Lena finds all sounds have left her in a gasping breath.  
  
Eventually, thankfully, the song ends.

The dancer lets out a laughing “holy shit!” and pulls the mime into a hug, which of course the idiot returns with equal enthusiasm. He spins her around, earning another giggle (a giggle! she’s giggling for him! She’s never giggled for Lena), and says,  
  
“Dude, your dancing is amazing! Do you do events?”  
  
The mime shrugs, looks thoughtful.

“I’m doing a community charity event in a couple weeks and we need more performers. Would you maybe do a set?”  
  
The mime lights up again - this man is getting an annoying amount of joy out of the mime today - and nods. He asks if they can exchange business cards and the mime whips one out of her pocket without any hesitation.  
  
“You have business cards?” Lena asks in horror before she can stop herself. The idiot startles a bit like she’d forgotten Lena was there before handing her one as well.

It’s got black and white stripes in the background and two simple lines of text:  
  
_The Mime of Metropolis_  
_metromime@gmail.com_  
  
  
Lena has never hated her more than in this moment.

* * *

  
Since childhood Lena rarely sleeps dreamlessly, and rarer still are the dreams particularly pleasant. She’d gotten in the habit of showering in the morning every day despite showering the night before as waking up from constant nightmares is sweaty business.

  
That night Lena dreams of something else.  
  
She dreams of stripes and quiet amusement.  
White gloves and bare skin.

Fingers pressing to her cheek - pressing into her mouth.  
Painted lips sucking at her thigh, white and black smeared on the sheets.  
  
Lena’s shower is cold that morning.

* * *

  
On a whim, Lena comes to the park on Saturday. 

Surely some sunshine is better than staying in her apartment for the entire weekend, and the park near the office does have a beautiful tree that’s just gotten its spring colors. Is the park thirty minutes further than the park right next to her apartment? Sure. But it’s not like she’s here on the off chance her buffoon of a mime might be as well. That would be ridiculous, and wrong.  
  
Lena ignores the little skip in her heart when she approaches her bench and sees her mime there. _The_ mime, she means. Not _her_ mime obviously.

Even under the makeup it’s clear to see how the idiot lights up when she sees Lena approach, and much to her embarrassment stops mid-routine to wave dramatically at her, causing the small crowd of onlookers to turn and watch her approach. Red-faced and looking down, Lena goes to where the mime’s things are and sits down.

Lena spends her day dozing, reading the two novels she brought with her, and watching the mime out of the corner of her eye. There are more people today than the weekday crowd, and the mime has laid out her stupid little bowler hat to accept donations. Surprisingly, it’s getting full.

By the fourth hour of her nonstop miming the hat is nearly to overflow. If Lena had no pride she’d tell her how impressive her longevity and skills clearly are - luckily, pride is something with which she overflows.

That’s when she notices him. He’s slouched a bit towards the edge of the crowd, eyes not on the mime but on her hat. Lena sits up at the sight of him, the hairs on her arms prickle. He is setting off all of her mental alarms. She tries to send psychic messages to the mime but the stupid idiot is in the process of swimming through an imaginary ocean for the amusement of some small child. The buffoon has no idea what’s coming when the man darts forward and swoops up the money-filled hat - but Lena does.  
  
She’s on her feet chasing before he’s even fully stumbled away from the crowd.  
  
“Hey!” she shouts, catching the attention of the group, “Come back here, fucker!”  
  
She sees the mime cover the little child’s ears with her gloved hands, like an idiot, but it doesn’t matter. If the mime won’t fight for her earnings Lena will have to.  
  
Despite her generally reserved life, Lena is fit and she’s able to gain ground on the thief relatively fast. He ducks behind a corner and she skids behind him only to gets knocked across the face - hard. It goes a bit black at that.  
  
She doesn’t realize she’s on the ground until she feels hands grabbing her, and for one horrible moment she thinks it’s the thief. The black in her eyes begins to clear, however, and she can see the terrified face of the mime.  
  
“Oh my god,” the mime says, “Are you okay?”  
  
“You can talk?” Lena says in response, and then blacks out.

 

* * *

  
Lena wakes in a hospital bed.

She’s in a hospital bed, her head feels like it’s about to explode, and there’s a small teddy bear on the table beside her wearing a striped shirt. She stares at it for much longer than she intended, not looking away until a knock at her door.

“Miss Luthor?” the woman who looks to be her doctor says. “I’m glad you’re awake. How are you feeling?”  
  
“Like I got punched in the face,” she croaks, her voice hoarse. The doctor smiles sympathetically.  
  
“You got hit pretty hard. We were a bit worried about you there for a minute.We’d like to keep you over night for observation, if that’s alright.”  
  
Lena nods, but then regrets it immediately as hot pain hits.

“Where’s the moron?” she says.

The doctor looks confused, so she clarifies: “The mime.”  
  
The doctor snorts, shakes her head.  
  
“The mime had to go to class, but she left me with very strict instructions to take care of you.”  
  
“The mime is in class?” Her head is spacey and the dots of this just don’t connect,“Is it…. is there mime school here?”  
  
The doctor laughs again, shakes her head.

“She’s right, you are funny.”  
  
“You know her?” Lena asks, surprised. The doctor smiles like she’s in on a secret.

“You could say that.”  
  
“Can you explain to me why she’s a fucking mime, then?”  
  
“That is a story I think she should tell.”  
  
Lena scoffs.  
  
“That’s all well and good but you’re assuming she’ll actually talk to me.”  
  
“I think she already is talking to you,” the doctor insists, “You’re just not hearing it. Sometimes you just have to meet people at their level.”

It’s so earnest that Lena hardly realizes how absurd the entire conversation is. After another moment of sincere eye contact, the doctor smiles.  
  
“Well, I’ll let you rest. If you need me, just have the nurse page for Dr. Danvers.”

* * *

  
The mime appears to be piloting some sort of jet plane when Lena arrives for lunch. 

Squatted down, hands gripped tight to the invisible controls, the mime flies across the sidewalk, skidding and droning around the amused group of children watching her perform. With such a focused energy Lena half expects her to lift off, just fold her legs up like retracting wheels and disappear into the sky.

It all comes skidding to a halt when her fool spots her, of course, her plane crashing to a sudden smiling halt. She recovers quickly, though, falling to the ground in a mimicked explosion. As if she intended to crash at the very sight of Lena. 

The children cheer while Lena rolls her eyes and plops down on the mime’s blanket, laying back. She’s smiling at Lena, her eyes a pretty green against the white-black paint, and she skips over to sit beside her. She reaches out a tentative hand to brush some hair from Lena’s face, fingers gentle on the still purpling bruise to her temple.

“I’m okay,” Lena says in response, “thank you so much for taking me to the hospital.”  
  
The mime’s hand flips, the back of her gloved knuckles now dragging gently down the side of Lena’s face. The black arrows painted beneath her eyes emphasize the genuine affection in her look. It’s all a bit much, really.

“You know,” Lena says, needing a distraction, “I seem to remember a certain someone saying a few words before I passed out.”

All at once the mime sits up straight with a forced pout of nonchalance on her lips.  
  
“Oh, it wasn’t you?” Lena asks in a disbelieving tone. The mime shakes her head, holds her hands up in confusion. She mimes getting knocked upside the head, flops over a bit in the process, tongue out eyes crossed, then rotates her pointer finger towards her head as if to say her brains are scrambled.

Lena shoves her in faux annoyance, trying not to grin when the mime dramatically flops over at the force of it.

“You’ll have to talk to me one of these days, you know.”  
  
The mime throws her arm around her in affection.

* * *

  
Lena wakes in a cold sweat at 2:30 am to the realization that she didn’t have her laptop bag with her when she returned from lunch yesterday.

Digging through her purse she finds the crumbled business card.  
  
It is such a stretch, but _God_. She cannot lose that laptop.  
  
Lena pulls out her phone and types the email:  
  
Subject line:  
_URGENT: Please Respond_  
  
Email body:  
_Dear Miss Mime,_  
  
_This is Lena, the woman whose lunch you ruin on a daily basis_

she pauses, remembers she’s asking a favor, and rewrites:  
  
_This is Lena, your park lunch companion._  
  
There. Much more diplomatic.  
  
_After our lunch this afternoon I misplaced my laptop bag. Did you see it? And if so, could you bring it to the park tomorrow morning before 9 and hide it behind the trash receptacle? The one those squirrels had sex on the other day._

Specificity is always a virtue, she thinks.

 _It’s safe return will be rewarded monetarily. Thank you for your quick response,_  
  
_Lena Luthor_  
_District Manager_  
_Luthor Corp_  
  
Good enough, she thinks, hitting send.

Lord help her - she needs her mime.

* * *

  
It’s rainy, and the bag isn’t there.

Lena had woken to an email reply from the fool that she assumed meant she would help her (the body of it was just the clown emoji and the thumbs up emoji), but she’s here now and neither the bag nor the fool are.

Once again, she was the fool.

Lena tries to go into work with her head held high despite knowing the shit storm coming her way. That laptop had her notes for the 2:30 meeting that she would be leading, and in her rush to get to the park at her usual time she had failed to back them up on the cloud. This is devastating, to say the least.

It’s as she is sitting contemplating her future unemployment that her coworker Sam appears, a mischievous smirk on her face.  
  
“Your friend is here,” she whispers to Lena like a secret. “She’s waiting for you up front.”

White hot tendrils of dread creep through her body instantly, because Lena doesn’t have friends. She has an idiot, and she has employees. That is the extent of her peer group and all her employees are already here.

With a gulp of resignation, she stands and walks towards the lobby. She tries to hold her head up with some level of pride (she is a Luthor, after all), but she should have known from the start that this fool would be her downfall. Her heart jumps at the sight of the fool’s striped shirt. She’s actually here, in her office, where all her employees can see her. They are going to destroy her.  
  
Someone points at Lena and the fool turns around, her face lighting up at the sight of Lena.

Two thoughts hit her at once:  
  
1.) she’s never seen the girl standing before her now in her life, and  
  
2.) this girl is so attractive she actually feels her heart stutter a bit.  
  
Like an idiot she freezes mid-step, eyes wide and mouth fumbling, but luckily she’s saved from whatever nonsense was about to come out of her mouth by the girl’s pure joy at seeing her.  
  
“Lena!” the girl nearly shouts, “I’m sorry I’m late. Traffic is insane.”  
  
There’s a very noticeable thickness to the girl’s accent; definitely Eastern European. Definitely adding to the confusion.  
  
“That’s alright,” she says diplomatically. The girl pulls her bag into view, thank God, and hands it to her.  
  
“Also I can’t make it to lunch today so I brought you these so you don’t miss me too much!”  
  
It’s a bag of cookies.  
  
“Err, thank you.”  
  
She feels deeply uncomfortable and it must show based on the endeared smile the girl gives her.  
  
“You are so cute, Lena,” she says before pressing a sudden kiss to Lena's cheek. “Ah shit, I’m gonna be late. See ya!”  
  
And then she’s gone.  
  
_What the hell just happened_ , Lena thinks, her fingers pressing to where the girl had just kissed her.

She pulls her hand away to see just the faintest hint of black.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lena had a sex dream about a mime. That's pretty fucking weird. Happy birthday, [babe!](http://www.girlpash.tumblr.com)


	2. can't get you off of my mime

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lena's not gonna date a fucking mime, okay?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this was only supposed to be 2 chapters but I have no control over my life so there'll be one more

Sam teases her relentlessly after the makeup-free moron leaves.

“So that’s who you sneak off to see every day,” she says from her seat on top of Lena’s desk, a space invasion Lena’s not sure how to handle. “we all thought you just didn’t like us. Never would’a guessed secret girlfriend.”

Sam picks up Lena’s stapler and fiddles with the sliding metal. It takes all of Lena’s personal restraint not to snatch it back, and she feels a cold sweat down her back at this onslaught.

“She’s not my secret girlfriend,” she offers, eyeing the stapler, “she’s my-”

Well, she’s not quite sure what she is, if she’s being honest.

“-Acquaintance,” she finishes lamely. Sam snorts.

“Uh huh, suuureee. Well your acquaintance was super cute. What does she do?”

It occurs to Lena this may be the most interest anyone has shown in her outside of a professional context since she’s moved to this city, outside of the idiot.

“She’s in school.”

Sam gives her a look, then laughs.

“Miss Luthor, such a cougar!”

Lena can feel her cheeks growing red as Sam laughs even harder. Finally, mercifully, Sam hops off her desk and places the stapler down. Her smile turns kinder, gentler.

“We’re all going out for drinks on Friday,” she says, like Lena should just know who the ‘we’ she mentions are, “you should come with us. You can bring your _acquaintance_.” 

A desperate hunger hits her deep in her chest, an echo of loneliness she’d worked hard to suppress.

“That would be wonderful,” she hears herself saying, “I’ll let her know.”

Sam does the most unthinkable thing then - she leans down and hugs Lena tight. It makes her feel panicky, sweaty and desperate, desperate to cling tighter. It’s almost addictive, being touched.

“Great!” Sam says after pulling back, “we’ll see you guys then!”

 

* * *

Lena puts a considerable amount of thought into how best to approach this dilemma with the idiot. She considers making comparison charts, pro and con lists of different approaches. Careful elimination until she finds the exact right way to broach it. There is an exact right way for her to say it.  
  
“We’re going out on Friday,” is what ends up coming out of her mouth, which is of course the worst way she could.

“I mean. I don’t- you don’t have to,” she runs her fingers through her hair, huffs, “my coworkers thought you were interesting. They invited us to get drinks on Friday. Both of us. They’ve never invited me anywhere before. Will you come?”  
  
The mimes confusion morphs into a big, happy smile.

* * *

Lena’s never felt more terrified in her life.  
  
This is new territory she’s entering with no allies beyond her fool - she can’t just go in there unprepared. The invitation was for “nine -ish, or whenever” which is so horrific it almost makes Lena back out four times. But Sam has spoken to her three times this week and, however brief, Lena’s becoming a bit fixated on the acknowledgement.

So Lena arrives for their night out just after 7:45, already feeling behind.  
  
She told her buffoon to meet her at a gas station two blocks from the bar.

The attendant has been watching her pace the aisles of the gas station for the last thirty five minutes with a weary indifference. She’s picked up and put down a dozen different items and checked her phone just short of 42 times when the idiot finally strolls in.

She doesn’t realize it’s her at first.

Her hair is down in soft ringlets, her makeup light in comparison to its normal white. She’s wearing glasses Lena had never seen on her before, and a loose crop top that’s striped black and white. Dark leather pants that look black in the off-white lighting. Deep set attraction creeps down Lena’s stomach, hitting her like a punch to the gut.

“Do you ever not dress like a fucking mime?” Lena asks then immediately regrets, but thankfully the idiot just laughs and laughs. 

“You look nice too, Lena,” she says in that thick accent Lena can’t quite place. The feeling in her groin jolts again. She hates this. She wants this to never end.

“Okay, here’s the plan,” Lena says, deciding an offensive approach is best in this moment. “We will arrive approximately two minutes early to the bar. I will do most of the talking, obviously,” she gestures to her foolish mime-lite attire, “and we will both do our best to not make them hate me any more than they already do.”

The amused smile fades from the fool’s face and much to Lena’s horror she steps in to pull her into a tight hug. A confused and alarmed sound emits from deep within Lena’s chest but she allows the contact for nearly 20 seconds before slithering her way free.

“Yeah let’s not make a habit of that.”

The mime laughs, lets her hands fall to grip Lena's upper arms affectionately. Her face soft in the fluorescent stuttering lights above, she says,

“They don’t hate you. You really gotta chill out, dude.”

That the first words spoken by the idiot are those makes Lena want to scream directly into her face, but her life spent in etiquette classes tampers it down to a scathing glare. And of course, the idiot just smiles and plods onward:

“This isn’t a business transaction. Your friends from work want to hang out a bar. It’ll be fun.”

“They’re not my friends. I don’t have friends,” Lena mumbles, angry and embarrassed, “and it doesn’t sound fun to me. It sounds stressful. Honestly, I think this is a mistake.”

The clown grabs her arm before she can retreat and pulls her into another loose embrace. Much to her shame, Lena hesitantly returns it.

“That’s just your brain freaking out,” her idiot mumbles into her hair, “Okay, what happens if we skip this and go get burgers instead?”

“I never get invited out again. I add to the pile of negative gossip that surrounds me everyday. I make no lasting bonds with my coworkers. Also I get sick, probably, because I’m a vegetarian.”

The idiot blinks owlishly, then grins.

“Right, okay. And what happens if we go?”

Lena lets out a little huff.

“I make a fool of myself, I make everyone hate me even more, I -” the rest of her words are mumbled into the buffoon’s palm. She pulls back, spluttering a bit,

“ _Bleh._ Why are you so salty?”

“Sorry I ran here. Listen, you gotta stop assuming worst case scenario all the time. Look, your brain is freaking you out. You’re trapped in fight or flight mode but the only choice you can pick is flight. Do you want me to tell you what’s actually gonna happen?”

Lena nods, terrified.

“We get drinks with your coworkers. It’ll be awkward. You’ll probably say something weird but if you don’t freak out about it people will move past it. I’ll be charming and compensate for you. We all get a little tipsy, you say something cute and endearing, the night ends with everyone thinking what a pleasant surprise it was hanging out with Lena and her super hot girlfriend.”

Lena’s brain stutters to a halt halfway through the play-by-play and wow is there too much to unpack there.

“Why do I have to be the weird one?” She says, latching on to the first thought that presses through the chaos of her brain, “you’re the fucking mime!”

“Yeah but I’m cute about it,” The idiot says with a grin that only fuels Lena‘s fury. The idiot grabs her hand and begins to drag her from the station.

“God, this is such a mistake,” Lena mumbles, “We’re just gonna walk into the bar and see all of my coworkers like ‘oh, hello everyone, this is my idiot mime, please accept us’.”

The idiot laughs, says,

“Maybe let me do the talking.”

“You’re a _mime_! You never do any talking!” She pauses, then adds, “and you are _not_ my girlfriend.”

Her buffoon throws an arm around her and continues to giggle like she doesn’t believe her.

She hates this fool.

* * *

Their entrance is met with a mixed review of greetings; most seem weary and distrustful of her presence. Understandably, considering her family.

Sam at least seems genuinely happy to see them.

“Lena!” She pulls her into a hug - tonight overflows with physical affection it seems - and then hugs the idiot as well who, of course, returns it just as enthusiastically.

“I’m so glad you came! And nice to see you again….” she draws it out, eyes darting from Lena to her mime, and Lena realizes with a sick sort of dread that she doesn’t know the idiot’s name.

Incredible.

Thankfully the idiot takes the initiative and says,

“I’m Kara! It’s so nice to see you, too. Thank you so much for inviting me. I always love a good reason to visit this side of town.” 

Sam visibly relaxes at the idiot’s - at _Kara’s_ \- words, and she can see the way her coworkers perk up a bit as well. Maybe her idiot was right - maybe this won’t be a total disaster. 

* * *

It’s a total disaster.

Things were fine until Lena’s elbow clips the table’s edge, knocking two full beers onto the ground just barely sloshing on Kara’s shoes. She wants the ground to open up and swallow her whole but the idiot just laughs and makes a joke about how her boots needed a washing anyway. She tries to jump in to the conversation tossing across the table but it’s something to do with the local sports team and Lena barely knows what sport it is.

“Buy everyone a drink,” her idiot whispers in her ear. Lena squints at her in confusion, so Kara loudly says, “Lena and I are gonna go get drinks for everyone.”  
  
Cheers follow them as Kara drags Lena towards the bar and orders a round.  
  
“Free drinks make everyone happier,” Kara says sagely. Lena just accepts this and instead asks,

“Why didn’t I know your name?”

“You never asked,” Kara says. They wave down the bartender and order, Lena sliding her her card.

“Would you have told me?”

Kara smiles mysteriously.

“Perhaps not. I like the names you give me.”  
  
Lena snorts.

“When I call you an idiot?”  
  
The bartender returns with a tray of drinks and Lena plucks one off for herself. She starts to head back to the table but Kara stops her, smiling mischievously.  
   
“When you call me _your_ idiot.”

“That’s stupid,” Lena mumbles into one of the drinks as she takes a sip and half-heartedly tries to hide the bright red blush she can feel filling her face.

Her idiot just laughs and laughs.

* * *

Things start to get easier as their drinks get lower. 

Lena’s always been a talkative drunk and she soon finds herself in the middle of a debate with two coworkers on the in-depth politics of the Star Wars universe. Her tongue feels a little heavy and her head a little light, but her coworkers are laughing and their yells are in competitive joy rather than frustration. The walls that always shutter up when she enters a room seem to be falling away, and Lena’s genuinely, deeply happy.  
  
Her eyes lazily drift across the bar as she realizes her Kara has vanished, but she soon spots her waiting in line behind what appears to be a bachelor party. They lock eyes and Kara crosses her eyes comedically, mimicking one of the especially drunk men in the group who is telling a very loud, physically expressive story. Lena can’t stop the snort that escapes her at the sight and her laugh only worsens as the idiot increases her miming tenfold only to accidentally bump into the man she’s impersonating.  
  
Watching her like that - miming like usual, but in bar clothes and pretty makeup - is like seeing two people at once. Her idiot merging with this new person, this Kara. So different yet somehow the same.

“You two are cute,” one of her coworkers says, cutting through her thoughts. “How long have you been dating?”  
  
“- Oh, we’re not, er, - ”  
  
“Y'all reminds me of me and my first husband,” her coworker continues, cutting her off with her own nostalgia,“we could have a whole conversation across the room with just a look and nod. That kind of connection is something special.”  
  
Lena’s not sure how to say she’s learned to pick up cues from watching her mime in a park everyday, so she just smiles blandly. The office intern cuts in then, his voice grating,  
  
“Wait, you're dating? Or did you say she was single? Because she is, oof,” he bites his lip obnoxiously, eyeing Kara from across the bar. Lena feels every muscle clench at once.  
  
“She’s off the market,” she snaps. The intern visibly deflates.  
  
“Oh, I didn’t know you-“  
  
“Yep,” she says, popping her lips on the p. He looks disappointed but still perks up just a bit when Kara comes back.  
  
“Hey, so Kara,” he starts, but Lena’s already out of her seat and dragging Kara away.  
  
“I have to use the bathroom,” she says as way of explanation. Kara follows without questioning even as they walk past the restroom door. She’s patient, watching Lena pace back and forth before her in the empty hallway adjacent to the main bar room.

“We’re not dating,” Lena finally says. Kara is visually unaffected.

“Okay.”

“I mean it. I don’t date mimes.”

Kara’s smiling at her and it’s making her mad.

“I believe you.”  
  
The feeling from before is creeping upward in her chest.

“Good. Cause I’m not going to date you.”

“I’m not gonna ask you to.”

Lena wants to scream.  
  
Instead, she crowds Kara back against the wall and kisses her.

There’s only a second of frozen surprise before Kara softens against her, wraps her hands around Lena's waist. She only meant for it to be a quick kiss, or maybe not - she didn't exactly have a plan going into this - but at the feel of Kara's tongue sliding across her bottom lip all higher thinking shuts down. It's only when a door slams nearby that she jumps back like she'd been shocked. Kara's just staring at her, a dreamy look in her eyes.   
  
"Stop being weird," Lena mumbles, red-faced with smeared red lips, and jogs away.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> things are getting steamy in my mime fic, huh


	3. mime goin' crazy here

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> it's raining mimes, hallelujah

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> LISTEN I know I said I would update 'You Deserve It All' next but I'm a dirty liar and you're all fools for believing me.
> 
> Also I wrote nearly 2.5k words in this chapter without even getting to the ending scene I've had planned from the beginning so there's gonna be one more chapter because fuck me amirite

She avoids the mime for another two weeks after that.

Not because she’s embarrassed, obviously. Lena doesn’t _get_ embarrassed, even when she slips up and accidentally makes out with a mime. That’s a normal drunk mistake. Everyone’s been there, right?

Regardless, Lena is not embarrassed; she’s just come to her senses. What on Earth was she doing, really, hanging out with Kara? Why did she even entertain the thought of anything - even friendship - with someone like her? What would someone like her even like in someone like Lena? Or.. no, she had that backwards, maybe.

It doesn’t matter.  
  
What matters is Lena is done miming around, and she makes that abundantly clear by ghosting the fool full-stop. She starts eating her lunch with her coworkers (who all mention again and again how much they loved her girlfriend, a title she opts not to correct). She takes the long route home every day just to make extra sure she doesn’t pass the park. She even deletes her email so the mime can’t reach out to her there, which in retrospect was not the smartest move considering she’d used that email for everything ever for the last five years. When Lena does something she commits completely.

This brilliant strategic move lasts exactly 16 days, during which the mime makes no effort whatsoever to reach her or drop by the office again. Absolute silence, a surprisingly unusual move for the mime. Frankly by day 16 Lena is pissed.  
  
So she does what any rational-minded woman would do in a situation like that and marches herself down to the park to scream at a stupid mime.

* * *

Kara’s whole face lights up when she sees Lena approach. She ends up waving her arms all big and exaggerated, breaking her entire routine - which of course causes the crowd that has somehow gathered on this Tuesday morning to turn and look. All at once a lot of Lena’s indignation rushes out of her. She’s not one to cause a scene, after all, so red-faced and subdued Lena goes to sit down on the mime’s blanket and wait.  
  
Ten minutes later the mime flops her way over and beams at Lena, ever silent. She just smiles at Lena like it hasn’t been sixteen days, thirty eight hours, and eleven minutes since they made out in the dingy hallway of a dive bar.  
  
It’s annoying.

“You’re seriously not gonna talk to me?” Lena finally asks. The mime just smiles still and then has the audacity to lay back on the blanket and close her eyes to rest.

“I know you can talk!” Lena shouts, poking at her shoulder.  
  
Kara gestures to her face makeup with a faux-serious scowl.  
  
“Oh of course. Can’t talk in uniform,” Lena drawls angrily. Lena feels like she might crawl out of her skin, a feeling further agitated by how fucking _chill_ the mime is acting. It’s like the stupid idiot is totally unfazed by their unspoken encounter.

Lena was expecting something, anything really. Some sort of acknowledgement. She hasn’t even once mimed making out with her, not even turning away with her arms crossed to grab at her own back and hair sensually as if implying there might be a hidden lover just blocked from view. Lena would even settle for some grotesque kissy faces and gestures. All in all it’s very disappointing to say the least. As always, it’s up to Lena to be the mature one.  
  
“Just because I kissed you doesn’t mean I like you,” she says, voice a much higher pitch than she’d like. Kara opens one eye to peek at her, smiles, then closes it again.  
  
“I mean it,” Lena continues, poking Kara in the side again, “we’re not gonna date and we’re not gonna kiss again, got it?”  
  
Kara purses her lips, clearly amused, and then nods sagely. Gives her an enthusiastic thumbs up. Honestly, it’s probably as good as she’s gonna get.

And now, with that settled, Lena thinks perhaps they can slowly start easing into a platonic, barely friendly interaction.

Lena does most (read: all) of the talking, undermining her carefully plotted two weeks of ghosting by regaling the idiot with minute details of every moment since they saw each other last. The mime sits back on her elbows and smiles at her the entire time, like hearing about Lena’s weird saga involving an expired veggie burger patty and a false fire alarm truly is the highlight of her whole mime life. They sit together until Kara’s phone beeps a warning alarm and Lena realizes she’s over her lunch break by thirty minutes.

Kara packs up all her stuff before seeming to remember something and, with a dramatic flourish, pulls a small sheet of paper from her backpack. She presents it to Lena like an offering to a goddess.

Lena grabs it tentatively with just the tips of her fingers, holding it away from her body.  
  
It’s a pretty basic flier advertising an event, the comic sans text reading:  
  
**Community Talent Showcase!  
** All Welcome, No Auditions Just Show Up  
Friday June 8th  
6-8 PM  
Steps outside Metropolis Downtown Library  
_hell yeah_

  
It looks like a middle schooler taking computers 101 designed it. Kara looks so excited.

“This is the show that guy invited you to be in, right?”  
  
Her fool nods, then gestures between her and Lena.  
  
“You want me to go with you?”

Kara points to Lena, points at her two eyes, and then points to herself.

“Ah. You want me to watch.”  
  
Kara nods again, beaming, and then does a little mime dance as if to demonstrate what the performance will be like. Lena can’t imagine a worse possible way to spend her Friday evening than seeing a mime performance outside of the downtown library.

Obviously she has to go.

“This isn’t a date,” she says immediately, and already Kara is doing a little victory dance, “If I come to this show it’s not as your date, okay?”  
  
Ever expressive under layers of paint, Kara smirks an infuriating smirk and nods.  
  
Lena hates the smug glint in the fool’s eyes even as her stomach flutters. They both know she’s lost.

“Fine. Fine, I’ll come to your stupid show.”  
  
Kara jumps in place with glee, throws a few fist pumps in there for good measure, and then pauses, grabs Lena’s hand. Cupping it almost reverently, she oh so gently kisses her knuckles. Then, without any further warning, jumps up and sprints away.  
  
“You’re being weird again,” Lena yells after the fleeing fool.

Without intending to she brings the cursed, freshly kissed hand towards her chest, cradling it in the other, and belatedly realizes there is a smudge of black across it.  
  
She doesn’t wash her hand again until her shower later that night.  
  


* * *

The turnout for the event is… less than stellar.

It’s 6 PM on a Friday night yet their small platform stage setup outside the library takes up more space than their audience. The crowd mostly consists of Lena, four teenagers who may have just been loitering outside the library and not intentionally looking for the show, and an elderly woman who might be asleep and drooling. Lena’s too socially uncomfortable to check.

Regardless, Kara is ecstatic when she sees Lena approach and immediately scoops her up into a twirling hug. Lena laughs, red-faced and twitchy, but hugs her back as well.  
  
“Alright, alright,” she says, patting Kara’s shoulders until she puts her down. “Time to show me your impressive skills, mime.”

And so she does.

Say what you will about miming (and Lena has a lot to say on that topic), but there is no question Kara is talented. She has an unbelievable connection with her own body. Every movement, every twitch, blends together to convey the story she’s weaving for her audience of six. Set to music, Kara folds and glides her way through an expressive dance that absolutely captures all of Lena’s focus. It’s amazing, and she can’t even hate herself for feeling that way.

Lena’s not even sure if she breathes through the entire six minute set, her eyes jumping along with her idiot’s graceful rolls and jumps. She does exhale with a happy sigh when Kara finally finishes with a bow. Lena is easily the loudest clapper in the crowd, if not the only one.  
  
Her applause tapers out just as the first drop hits.

Everyone - aside from their elderly sleeper - looks up at once and, sure enough, clouds have begun to roll in, and with them the beginning of a drizzle.

Before anyone can fully process what is coming the rain turns torrential.  
  
Lena didn’t change from her pencil skirt and blouse after work so she is ill-equipped to handle this onslaught. She’s overwhelmed instantly. Rain-soaked hair plasters around her face, shielding her eyes and nose in a chaotic curtain of cold, and she fumbles blindly towards where she thinks the stage might be. She feels her heel snapping in the cracked concrete below her but there’s little she can do beyond falling with her arms protective around her face.

Her fall is stopped by the strong, sturdy arms of her mime, who is - much to her absolute fury - laughing.

“This isn’t funny!” she screams, her words a bit garbled from the constant assault of water and soaked hair. The mime laughs, reaches forward to wipe the hair clumps out of her mouth. She cups her face gently, soaked gloves clinging to skin. Her eyes shine stark in contrast with the grey globs melting down her face, whites and blacks mixing to dribble away in the storm. Bits of soft skin peek through, rosy and warm against the smears. Lena kind of wants to kiss her.  
  
That horrendous thought is deterred, thankfully, by the bright flash of lightning overhead followed almost immediately by thunder. All at once standing on a wooden stage in a large open space seems very, very dumb.  
  
Her idiot grabs her hand and they start to run together, towards what Lena doesn’t know, but she quickly finds herself stumbling off-tilter over the rock-lined path. She nearly falls again into Kara’s back, just barely catching herself. Without even a moment of hesitation the fool scoops her up into her arms in a ridiculous bridal carry and continues her sprint through the rain.  
  
The whole thing is ridiculous.

If someone who knew Lena were to see her in this very moment she is sure no one would recognize her. She’s a shaking mess, dirty in her muddy designer clothes, in the arms of a woman with grey paint dripping down her face on to said dirty clothes. The two of them look ridiculous, holding on to each other in the rain, Lena with no shoe on, laughing harder than she’s ever laughed before.

  
Ridiculous.  
  


* * *

  
It’s only when Kara is squish-stepping her way down a poorly lit apartment hallway that Lena realizes she has no idea where they’re going.

  
“I have to put you down now,” Kara says with a slight shake to her voice that matches the shakes in both of their bodies. The adrenaline is fading and soaked clothing feels a lot less fun in air conditioning.  
  
“Oh so now you’ll talk to me,” Lena says through chattering teeth. Kara ignores her remark, puts her down.  
  
Lena stumbles a bit as she’s placed, still wearing one heel while the other hangs tattered in her hand. The idiot pulls out a key and starts fumbling with the door. It takes a few tries to steady her hand enough. They’re both shivering like two chihuahuas in a fight.Even with her face smeared in greys she’s beautiful.  
  
“Of course. Once the paint starts to run my mouth does, as well,” Kara says, stepping inside. Lena follows her in with a groan.  
  
“God, you’re such a loser.”

The apartment is cute, though much smaller than anywhere Lena has ever lived. It’s a studio with high walls and tacky furniture, a hodgepodge of clothes and clutter strewn about. Very lived in, very foreign to her world. Lena likes it.  
  
“I will get you dry clothes,” Kara says, walking towards the kitchen where the laundry set sits comfortably beside the fridge, “We can put your wet ones in the dryer.”  
  
Then without any hesitation the fool peels her soaked shirt off and tosses it in the open dryer. Lena’s mouth has never felt drier.

Kara pulls her pants off, tosses them in as well, then looks back at Lena who does her very best to drag her eyes back up to meet Kara’s. Judging by the knowing smirk she sees even under the grey smudge, she isn’t too subtle.  
  
“Well?” Kara asks in a voice that would be painfully sexy if not for the shaking, “are you gonna take ‘em off?”  
  
Lena stutters a bit through an affirmative, croaks out a request for some water. Kara laughs and goes to get it, giving Lena a moment to compartmentalize and regain control.

It’s not a big deal.  
  
So the mime is half naked five feet from her, ten feet from a very appealing bed.  
  
This doesn’t have to be weird.  
  
Kara bends to pick up some clothes and Lena's eyes immediately follow the curves of her back, the ripple of muscles she never knew existed under that stupid striped look.

Dammit, Lena is _definitely_ gonna make this weird.  
  
With hands shaking from more than the cold, she peels the blouse up over her head with an obnoxious amount of difficulty. She mostly has it, really, but she wore a long necklace today that accentuates her cleavage and it’s somehow gotten tangled in the straps and now she finds herself trapped in a cage of her own making, arms jumbled up by her head and wet cloth plastered to her face.  
  
She must have made a sound of distress amidst her accidental self-inflicted waterboarding, because seconds later she feels warm fingers touching her exposed hips.  
  
“Need a hand?” she hears close to her head. She does her best to nod.  
  
The hands trail hot up her sides, skimming her bra to grip cloth. With hardly any effort at all the mime tugs it free and Lena allows her arms to fall, then swipes her hair from her face.  
  
Blinks against the sun beam refracted through the window and soon realizes just how close her fool is standing. Leaning forward slightly, face smeared grey and nearly naked, breathing inches from Lena.  
  
Without another thought Lena presses up on her toes to kiss her, her hands clutching at bare shoulders. It’s hot, almost, until the cosmetic taste of paint hits her tongue. She pulls back with an audible _bleh._

“God, that’s,” she spits a bit, “really gross.”

And Kara? She just laughs and laughs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wouldn't it be wild if there was mime sex


	4. possibly maybe mime falling for you

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if even one of you mime fuckers tells me this chapter turned you on I am calling the police.

 

“So are you, uh, studying mime in college?”

This gets her a snort from Kara. Things have cooled a bit since their painted make-out. Kara washed the makeup from her face and Lena quickly dropped her wet clothes in favor of the fresh ones Kara offered. She tries to be subtle when she presses the collar of the faded old sweatshirt to her face, breathing in the scent she’s come to associate with her dumb mime. She also pointedly avoids looking at the soft red glow of Kara’s freshly scrubbed cheeks, no matter how attractive they may be.

“No,” Kara says, “that’s not really a hot major here. I’m studying dance and performance arts.” She moves to the kitchen area and grabs a kettle, takes it to the sink to fill. Lena finds herself trailing a few steps behind as if pulled by some tether tying her to Kara. It’s instinct, being close to her. “There really is no career in miming, sadly.”  
  
Lena wants to say something cute, something flirty that might guide them back towards the bed. So she says this:  
  
“Well, that makes sense since miming is pretty stupid.”

Kara just smiles crookedly at her, and the glint in her eye has Lena immediately regretting saying anything.  
  
“ _Well,”_ Kara drawls, “did you know that the world’s most famous mime-”  
  
“Without even hearing the rest of that sentence I can promise you the answer is no.”  
  
_“-The world’s most famous mime,_ ” Kara continues, poking Lena’s stomach affectionately, “was literally the coolest person that ever lived?”  
  
Lena can’t even imagine what her face must be doing in this moment, but judging by Kara’s immediate burst of laughter it’s definitely conveying how she feels.  
  
“I’m serious!” Kara insists, turning back to the kettle. “He was a French Jew during WWII and joined the resistance. He actually helped save hundreds of Jewish orphans. He used his mime skills to keep the kids calm while they snuck over the border. He was the coolest guy.”  
  
Kara pours them both some tea and guides Lena back over to her bed, as its basically the only seating in the apartment. She seems lost in her thoughts then, so Lena waits. After a few more moments Kara speaks again.  
  
“His life was amazing, and he spent most of it silent in stage makeup. He wasn’t afraid, and he lived a long full life built on communicating through body language. It’s-” she sighs, shakes her head, looks down at her lap timidly, “It’s incredible. English.. it’s still hard for me, sometimes, but my body is always clear.” Kara pauses to sip her tea then, looks so thoughtful in this moment in a way Lena has never seen before and she realizes that this is something serious for Kara. Something important.

She tries to tread lightly.

“So English isn’t your first language?” she asks.

Kara smiles sadly.  
  
“Russian,” she says, then adds, “Did you know I was adopted?”

Lena just shakes her head because no, there is a lot she doesn’t know about Kara.  
  
“When I was a child my family wanted me to learn English, so they sent me to stay with my American cousin for the summer,” she pulls back, inward, place her cup on the floor so she can wrap her arms around herself before pushing on, “Their car crashed driving home from the airport that night. By the time my plane touched down in Kansas I’d gone from having two parents to none.”

The words fall so steadily from her mouth they have to be rehearsed. Undoubtedly Kara has told this story many times over the years, her life’s greatest tragedy condensed to a soundbite.

“I am so sorry,” Lena says, floundering a bit in the face of immeasurable grief. So she just follows with,“well, your English is impeccable.”  
  
This gets a small, self-deprecating laugh.  
  
“Yes, well. I had a bit of a crash course when I realized my cousin Clark barely spoke my language. Clark did his best but he was so young and unprepared. He expected two months with me, not a lifetime. So instead he connected with some Russian language professors at Metro U who were looking to foster and soon enough I was Kara Danvers.”  
  
She holds her hands up in a small _ta-da!_ flourish, a thin smile on her face.

“I’m so, so sorry,” Lena says again, grabbing her hands. She runs her thumbs over them firmly, hoping to convey even an ounce of her feelings through such a tiny gesture. Kara smiles for real then and laces their fingers together. Lena can feel the pressure building in her chest and her only choice is to break the moment entirely by blurting something out.

“But why did you choose to be a mime? Other than to be the absolute bane of my existence?”  
  
Thankfully Kara laughs.  
  
“You are an added bonus,” she says with a wink, “but I’ve been into it since I was a kid. Not into miming, I mean, but like, storytelling through movement. Mr. Danvers died so soon after I came to stay with them and their home was just, shrouded in grief. There was so much sorrow and there was nothing I could do - I could barely speak their language then, how could I know the words to say? So I spoke with my body, my face. I may not have words to comfort, but I knew the ways to make them laugh.”  
  
She smiles distantly, lost in memories.  
  
“The first time my adoptive sister Alex laughed was a month after his death, and it was because I pantomimed being eaten by a shark and then accidentally fell off a sand dune. I sprained my wrist, but I’d made that weight of mourning lift for a few minutes. There was nothing better.” Her eyes met Lena’s again and she shrugs, “And I’ve been doing it ever since.”

Kara lays back on the bed with a sigh and slowly Lena follows. She tries to leave space but Kara scoots over immediately, pressing fully against her side. Every part of her is aware of Kara, it’s like she can feel an electric hum at all the places they touch. She waits. After a few moments, Kara speaks.

“I speak so little Russian now. I can feel it slipping away from my tongue. There are words I knew that are just gone now, and words I was too young to learn that I’ll now never learn. And English is still so hard, there are so many parts to it that I can’t connect.”

Kara rolls on to her side then, props her head up against her hand to stare at Lena. Lena can do nothing more than stare back.  
  
“I feel like I am floating between worlds with no solid ties to hold,” Kara continues, “I don’t know how to say how that makes me feel, but I do know how to convey it physically. Bodies are a universal language. I feel most articulate when I’m not talking at all.”

“That’s really nice, actually.”

“Also miming has a 100% return rate on getting me pretty girls.”

“And there it goes. Wait, who are all these girls you’re miming for?”

“Only you, of course. And I managed to get your affection, so I’ve got a perfect score.”

“You’re an idiot,” she says, blushing. “And you overestimate your game.”

Something flashes in Kara's eyes at the challenge, and all at once Kara is crowded into Lena’s space. Lena can’t stop the jilted little breath that escapes at having Kara so close, breathing the same air. Kara waits a moment before kissing her. Lena melts immediately into it, letting out a little noise when Kara’s tongue brushes across her lower lip. All her focus buzzes away til she’s only aware of the points Kara connects with her. Hands, chests, lips. It's a slow kiss, wet and open mouthed, lips softly dragged between teeth. Her insides might be melting.

Eventually, slowly, Kara pulls away. Lena’s staring with half lidded eyes, ears rushing.

“I dunno,” Kara says, voice rough and low, “I think I’m doing pretty good so far.”

She's smirking like she's won. Like it hasn't only just begun.

Lena barely gives her a second to breathe before she's pulling her down. Mouths slanted, teeth clanging, her kisses are messy and off-center and she needs a thousand more. Kara moves to cover her fully, thighs bracketing Lena's hips. She presses her down into the bed, presses kisses across her mouth, her jaw, against her ear.

It's sensitive there, the soft touches causing chills along her arms and her hips to buck against her. Lena's hands skirt along, never finding a spot along Kara's body to linger on. She wants to touch everything. The fabric shifts under her grip and like this, with her eyes closed and the sound of breathing the only melody filling the air, she allows herself to see through her mind's eye. She imagines the familiar stripes for a moment, sees how they fit snug around Kara's body, how they would look pressing her down into the mattress. Unexpectedly, she moans, drawing a moan in response from Kara.  
  
“You are so beautiful,” Kara whispers then, and all at once Lena crashes from that floating headspace. “I’ve wanted this for so long.”

Lena squints her eyes just a bit tighter, grips her firmly.  
  
“Stop talking. You’re ruining it.”  
  
And then, for some unfathomable reason, Kara stops. Just, freezes there, on top of her.  
  
“Lena,” she says, and there’s a definite smile in her voice, “Is my talking ruining your fantasy of me? Do you prefer when I... _don't talk_?"

Finally Lena catches up to the conversation. Like a tidal wave embarrassment washes over her. She tries to sit up and push Kara away from her but the taller girl wrestles her back down, pins her wrists beside her head. Lena’s hips grind up unintentionally, which only makes the fool even cockier.  
  
“Did you imagine this happening in a different way?” Kara whispers into her ear, and it’s very embarrassing and very sexy and Lena wants to die. “Like, for instance, with me as a mime?”  
  
“You _are_ a mime,” Lena tries to deflect, but Kara’s smiling like she’s been let in on the best secret there is to know. That smile turns deadly as she rolls back against the steady roll of Lena’s hips - when did she start doing that again? - and nuzzles her way to her ear to whisper,  
  
“Are you picturing me with the makeup on?”  
  
Goosebumps and shame dance across Lena in an instant as she tries once again to worm away from Kara, but the other girl only presses her down more firmly beneath her. Kara releases a hand so she can drag her fingernails up Lena’s side, dragging her shirt up with the movement. Lena’s newly freed hand tangles in the hair at the back of Kara’s head, gripping tight.   
  
“Are you thinking about me in those stripes?” she presses an open mouthed kiss to Lena’s throat, earning a gasp, “About me leaving paint smears all over you?”  
  
Lena arches against her with an embarrassed groan, gripping at her hair tight enough to make Kara's head lift a bit. She hates this so much, hates that she can feel Kara’s smirk against her collarbone. Hates how fucking turned on she is.  
  
“Do you want me to put my gloves on?” Kara whispers, kissing where the shirt meets Lena’s cleavage. This is the moment that does it. Despite the teasing, despite all the embarrassment Lena feels and has felt from the instant she first laid eyes on this idiot in the park, Lena doesn’t hesitate.  
  
“God," she moans, "Yes. Please.”

Kara’s climbing off her in an instant, rummaging through the dirty clothes pile on her floor while Lena lays on her back, panting and aching in a way she will never discuss out loud after this. She barely has time to react when Kara rips her shirt off before sliding a striped shirt over her head while she moves to straddle Lena again, smirking at the pathetic moan Lena lets out at the sight of it. A few movements more and she’s got the gloves on as well.  
  
Helpless, Lena clenches her fist in the striped material and tugs until Kara’s lips meet her own.

There's a desperation to her kisses that she's never felt before, and the feel of gloved hands on her bare skin has her shaking. Her hands move from tugging and gripping at Kara's shirt, undecided on if she wants to tear it off or keep it on forever. What makes it worse, though, is that she can feel her fool smiling into each of their kisses, like she's enjoying Lena's shameful interest. It's infuriating.

It worsens still when Kara pulls away suddenly, sitting up to carelessly card her white gloved fingers through her hair. Lena tries not to whimper at the lost contact but absolutely does whimper when she takes in the full sight. Kara, face flushed and red, clear and beautiful. The striped shirt, tugged so low her shoulder peeks out yet bunched up enough to reveal a tummy Lena wants to kiss. The stupid fucking gloves, capturing all of her focus as Kara drags her hand over her glistening mouth.  
  
“If you’d like,” Kara says, smiling while Lena suffers, “I can go put the makeup on.”  
  
Her smile is so earnest and open that it makes Lena feel a little nauseous. She's hit then with a terrible urge to cry or confess her love, so instead she just shakes her head and pulls Kara back into another kiss, swiping her tongue across her lower lip in hopes of distracting her from this entire situation. And it works for a few minutes, the two exchanging kiss after open-mouthed kiss, Lena quietly shivering at the feeling of gloves tracing along her skin. Her trembling only escalates as the gloves dance along her chest, down her stomach and along her thighs, circling with a leisure Lena can hardly stand.  
  
Finally Kara lets her hand rest for a moment there, right at the crease where her thigh meets her embarrassingly wet panties. Her hand is steady even as Lena shakes.  
  
"Sweetheart," Kara says, and Lena just tightens her already tightly closed eyes. "Please look at me."  
  
It takes a moment to do it, to release the tension enough to fully open her eyes and look into Kara's. She immediately wants to slam them closed again forever.  
  
There is so much unbridled affection in Kara's eyes, shining down on her like she's some precious thing, like she wasn't just getting off to the idea of boning a mime.   
  
"All I want is to make you feel good in whatever way you want. We don't have to have sex. We can watch a movie or I could give you a back rub or I could take you home. Whatever you want! I don't wanna do anything you don't wanna do."  
  
Lena wants to say that all she wants is to get fucking railed, but her jaw is locked up from the tension and she hasn't quite stopped shaking. This terrifies her completely and she can feel herself spiraling over all the reasons this could never work. How she could never work for someone like Kara.

But she's so tired of being afraid, and this desire for Kara outweighs every fear she carries. There's no one she would trust more with her fears than Kara.   
  
So she grabs one of those stupid gloved hands and brings it to her face, kisses her palm and presses it to her cheek. Bites her lip again to hold in those stupid loving words, but knows her eyes give her away. She can see it all reflected back at her in Kara's eyes anyway.  
  
"I want you," she finally says, and pushes the hand back down her body. "Touch me. Please."  
  
Her heart freezes for a moment when Kara stops her, pulls her hand back. But instead of yanking it away in disgust like she halfway anticipated, Kara drags it up to her mouth to bite at the glove's fingertip. Pulls it off with her teeth. Lena moans at the sight, feeling a mix of arousal and disappointment as Kara tosses the glove aside.   
  
"Yeah no, that glove is super dirty," Kara says, smiling at the little jolt Lena has when her now bare hand touches her thigh again. "Don't worry, babe. Next time I'll make sure I have a clean pair."

Lena's hips roll sharply at the implication of a next time, of a _this_ time, and she lets out a breath she didn't know she was holding.

Kara kisses her then, softer than before. Carefully, like she's handling something precious. Lena gasps when she feels the tentative press of fingers against her panties, light pressure matching light kisses. Lena doesn't want light, though, and she wraps her arms once more around the striped shirt she loathes and loves, tugs her firmly against her. She moans as the pressures along her body increase to match, the touch of Kara's hand grinding in time to her hip's thrusts. The taste of Kara's tongue has her moaning again and she's sure her hands scraping across her back are leaving marks.   
  
Finally Kara shifts, and her hand glides from outside her panties to within. 

Kara is pressing kisses against Lena's throat and mumbling something she can't quite make out and all at once Lena is overwhelmed by the heat of it, by the sweat that's already forming on both of their bodies and the heat that's building inside of her from the steady drag of Kara's fingers against and then finally in her.   
  
She can't focus on anything beyond the sensation of Kara; it surrounds her and consumes her and she never wants to be anywhere but here, with her.

It hits her suddenly, a shuddering flash of white, her body locking again from a different sort of tension before slowly melting away. Her toes curl at the feel of it. Kara's weight above her feels like a sweaty blanket of safety. Lena definitely might be in love with her.  
  
She doesn't even realize she's crying until Kara wipes at her tears with her other, still gloved hand. When she smiles at her Lena can feel the world shift, just a bit. Just for her.  
  
They lay in bed together afterwards, staring into each others eyes. Kara looks so incredibly happy that Lena almost wants to look away - never in her life has anyone looked at her with such joy. Joy for her.   
  
“How lucky am I?” Kara finally says, voice dripping with affection. “I found the one girl in the world who’s super horny for mimes.”

Lena promptly shoves her off the bed and on to the hardwood floor below.

 

* * *

  
It takes very little effort for Kara to regain her spot in the bed cuddled around Lena like an octopus.  
  
"Jeez," Kara says, and Lena can hear the deep smile in her voice. "I'm so happy right now."  
  
There's so much joy in that one statement and it brings back that panic from before, rumbling within Lena like an old break you still feel years after the cast has been removed.

"You are such a weirdo and I like you so much," Kara continues to say, and for some reason that's what breaks her. 

“Why do you say things like that?" Lena snaps, pulling away. "Why do you like me so much? What could you possibly like about me?” There are tears in her eyes unexpectedly, and the sight of them combined with her words brings a concerned little noise from Kara. “No one else has ever treated me like this and I don’t understand why you do.”

Kara pulls back to look at her, really look at her, eyes darting across her face with slow sweeps.   
  
“I think you're one of the neatest people I've ever met," she says after a moment, steel in her voice, "And I treat you like this because you’re important to me, and I enjoy being with you. I want us to date.”  
  
Lena won't meet her eyes.  
  
“But I’m so mean to you."  
  
Her lip shudders. Kara touches it gently with the one hand still wearing the glove, rubs across it until the shaking stops.   
  
“You’re really not. You’re kind of grouchy sometimes, but it’s cute. You’re cute.”

 Lena can't help the intensity of her stare nor the tears streaming down her face, not when Kara is talking in such strange ways.

“You actually want to date me?" she asks again, "This isn’t some weird elaborate prank?”  
  
And Kara just smiles at her like she always does and says,  
  
“I actually do. I’m pretty sure we already are dating. I’ve just been waiting for you to catch on.” 

Lena wipes her nose with a loud unlady-like snort, then nods.  
  
“Fine! We’re dating, fine."  
  
Kara kisses her then, snot faced and all, and it's like a part of Lena's heart just clicks into place. Of course it's the idiot from the park, of course.

Who else could it have been?  
  
They kiss for long moments, lost in each other, before Kara finally pulls back with a sigh.  
  
“Lena," she says, and Lena already knows something's coming, "I’m just so glad you finally made up your mime.”

Lena grabs her face at that, presses forehead to forehead staring deep into her eyes, and whispers, 

“I’m gonna fucking murder you,” before kissing the laugh right off of Kara’s lips.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can't believe you just read mime sex, you fuckin weirdo.
> 
> The mime Kara talks about was Marcel Marceau, and his life story is pretty fascinating. He really was a resistance fighter who is credited with saving literal hundreds of Jewish orphans. Would highly recommend reading up on him.


End file.
